Night Song (The Guild Wars Book 9) by Mark Wandrey (best ereader under 100 .txt) 📕

“Never underestimate that sneaky doggo,” Sergeant Bana said. Alan could almost see him shaking his head inside his CASPer. High above him, hundreds of silver darts lanced across the sky.

His radio crackled with a distant broadcast. “This is Big Strong Fist, we fight on both flanks.”

“Who have you engaged? What race?” Alan asked.

“Pushtal. We fight Pushtal.”

“Acknowledged, preparing to attack.” Alan cut the channel.

“If the Pushtal are on the flanks, Zuul are in the middle. Do we tell them?” Jill asked from a hundred meters to his left, commanding Company B.

“Would it change the situation?”

“Probably not,” she replied.

“Agreed. All units, advance!” Just over the horizon, lasers crisscrossed the sky and tiny explosions bloomed. Ripley’s barrage had arrived. A second later, Silent Night raced ahead at a run.

* * *

Drake tore his eyes from the sky, knowing that despite all the practice, he still needed to keep focus on his pace. Formation was an entirely different beast, and actual combat…

He hadn’t really bonded with any of the Paku Zuul. Why would he have? He had enough to deal with from his siblings, and more than enough ties to stupid Humans, the last thing he needed was to care about an assload of strangers because they—what? They were shaped like him?

Keeping perfect pace with the CASPers around him, he snorted and focused his attention forward.

Where the missiles were aimed, a cluster of reeking, angry, ferocious Pushtal waited.

Along with who knew how many of his own kind.

Isgono wouldn’t be there, though, the crazy old teacher wouldn’t have been prioritized with the fighters who’d left the Paku. Or wouldn’t have been thrown out into space in the middle of a battle when there was some dubious safety to be found on board. He was sure one of those things must be true, though entropy knew Isgono had never told them anything helpful, like how an evacuation was handled.

Like what to do when you had orders to kill the very people who’d been helping you.

Which had to be better than betraying the people who’d raised you. Your family. Family was more important than species? Wasn’t it?

Unhelpful. This was combat, not training, and he had a CASPer that was his, and no one was going to drop into his wave. He watched the missiles streak ahead, knew the impact would come moments before they broke into enemy lines.

Besides, there were a couple of Silent Night’s mercs that could drop out, and he wouldn’t spare a blink of mourning. Long as they did their job first—

No. He checked the thought, sent a silent thanks to Ripley for giving great air coverage, and considered the damage the Lumar would be doing from either side.

Those mercs weren’t clever, but Drake knew all about being underestimated when you were big and mostly monosyllabic. No doubting those lads were worth more than their weight in a fight—point them in a direction, and expect that direction clear.

A throbbing stabbed from his jaw down his neck, and he realized belatedly he’d been clenching the whole run.

Breathe. Breathe, move, and aim.

Everything on the other side was only a target.

He couldn’t afford for them to be anything else.

* * *

A kilometer before their objective was a low line of hills. Alan guessed they were there on purpose, that the enemy had chosen this terrain to give them some cover against long range laser engagement. Whatever the reason, they needed to get over them, and as soon as they did, they’d be in sight of their objective.

“Careful on your jumps,” he cautioned his mercs. “Don’t want to make yourselves easy targets.” He added the last for his kids’ sakes, because his stomach felt like it was full of jack jumpers. Bloody hell, he was scared for them. He still remembered his first fight in a CASPer, some 30 years ago. He’d fought for several minutes before his platoon sergeant had reminded Alan to release his safeties before his weapons would fire.

As was his tradition and prerogative, Alan was at the front of the left formation. His first platoon was all around him as they broached the hill, riding their jumpjets. He could see on his tactical Tri-V—a feature of the slightly bigger cockpit on his command model Mk 7—the elevations of all the mercs. They came over the rise within seven meters’ altitude of each other. He’d never felt prouder of his lads.

“Objective in sight,” the scouts called.

“Game on,” Bana growled.

Alan liked the man, a lot. Probably the best sergeant he’d ever served with. He hadn’t held it against the man for reminding him to take his safeties off all those years ago.

“All units, prepare to engage,” he ordered.

Alan took his eyes off his mercs and began scanning the enemy base. The Cartography Guild had spared no expense. The mobile firebase was, for lack of a better term, impressive. However, it was more armor than firepower. Regardless, he had to breach those defenses in order to get his people home.

The timing was perfect. Ripley’s wave of missiles were screaming in on target just as he was examining their objective. The firebase’s array of anti-missile lasers flashed in the morning sky, turning missile after missile into blooming balls of fire. He briefly considered ordering Rex to see if he could take the laser out. His son had one of only four heavy MACs in their unit. The range was still five kilometers, outside the ideal envelope for the weapons.

Craaack! The MAC on Rex’s CASPer spoke even as Alan was considering.

“Save the rounds, lad,” Bana said immediately. “It’s too bloody far.”

“Yes, Sergeant,” Rex replied. The tone in Rex’s voice made Alan smile. The kids were too excited to be scared.

“Can’t wait to use his dardy new MAC,” Sonya said with a